Apple sued Samsung because Samsung copied the iPhone.

Samsung claimed that they totally didn't copy the iPhone... even though it was kind of obvious that they did. But, then again, Samsung copies most everything from Apple. There are even blogs dedicated to showing all the stuff they copy.

Today the jury dropped their verdict, which supports Apple's claims and totally called Samsung out for being fucking tracers...

And now all the hand-wringing has started because Samsung is crying that this verdict will stifle innovation. That companies won't make smartphones anymore because they'll worry about being sued by Apple. That consumer choice will be limited in the US because only Apple will be making phones.

Which is all a load of crap. Anybody can make a smartphone... just stop fucking tracing over Apple!

Instead, why not make your own damn smartphone design? Like the Nokia did with their Windows Lumia phone...

Looks nothing like Apple. Nobody's going to confuse that with an iPhone.

Unlike the Samsung Galaxy S...

Just admit it, Samsung. You're a fucking tracer!

And, because I just can't stop myself...

Such an awesome movie.

Time to put down that Olympic remote... because Bullet Sunday starts... now...

   
• Negative. When it comes to living in the USA, I cannot help but question the society we have evolved into when there's this incessant need to tear people down. This was made very clear to me as I watched NBC's continuing shitty time-delayed coverage of the Olympic games yesterday. Ryan Lochte had just won the gold in a swimming event with a very impressive performance. But this wasn't the focus of the coverage. The focus was on how Lochte had just "delivered a beating" to reigning Olympic champion Michael Phelps, who came in fourth. Once I heard this "beating" mentioned for a third time, I had to turn the channel.

Photo by Al Bello/Getty Images

Just four years ago, Michael Phelps won 8 out of 8 gold medals in the 29th Olympic Games in China. He was America's pride and joy and the media couldn't gush with praise often enough or fast enough for "the greatest swimmer of all time." And now? The media is using those 8 medals around his neck to strangle the guy by pointing out what a disappointment he is for not getting another medal. And, putting aside how crappy it is that they are so horrible to Michael Phelps... how shitty is it that this is how Ryan Lochte's friends and family watching at home get to experience his moment of triumph?

And why? Why? Why? Why? How hard would it be to say "Congratulations to Ryan Lochte for winning the gold, and way to go Michael Phelps for a terrific effort in snagging fourth place!" Because, seriously, even putting aside his Olympic championship status... out of all the athletes from around the frickin' WORLD, Phelps came in fourth! That's still an amazing achievement. And what the hell have you done lately?

But this, apparently, is not what the American public wants to see or hear. They want Michael Phelps humbled and humiliated. Building somebody up is great, but tearing them down is better. Yes, it's surprising that Phelps didn't medal. Shocking even. So say it's surprising and shocking... don't "give a beating" to somebody who trained hard and did their best. Even if it is somebody as accomplished as Michael Phelps, who still has a bunch of Olympic medals back home.

   
• Clarkson. And, speaking of tearing somebody down, this happened on Twitter...

Now, as a massively huge fan of Top Gear, I should post a disclaimer which says that I am a massively huge fan of Jeremy Clarkson. He's a total bastard in the best possible way, and one of the most entertaining television personalities ever.

So when he tells Mitt Romney to "fuck off" it would be easy to write this off as Jeremy Clarkson being Jeremy Clarkson. Except... Mitt Romney made a disastrous visit to the UK where he pretty much had his head up his ass the entire time. First he tells London that he didn't think they were ready to host the Olympics and questioned whether the Brits can "come together" and celebrate the games properly... then a quote from his book No Apology was widely circulated in the UK press: "England is just a small island. Its roads and houses are small. With few exceptions, it doesn't make things that people in the rest of the world want to buy. And if it hadn't been separated from the continent by water, it almost certainly would have been lost to Hitler's ambitions." Nice. Not only does he show he's fucking ignorant about the country ("England" is not an island. "Great Britain" is an island that includes the countries of England, Scotland, and Wales) he seems to think the way to make the United States look good is to put other countries down. What an asshole.

So yeah, tear somebody down and you deserve to get torn down in return. I guess that works.

   
• Hey Jude. And speaking of something that England produced that nobody wants...

In my alternative history fantasy world, the Beatles reunited for the first time in 42 years to perform at the 2012 London Olympic Games.

As happy as I was to see Sir Paul McCartney close out the Opening Ceremonies... the mega-Beatles-fan in me will always want more...

   
• BILL! BILL! BILL! There's a funny YouTube video making the rounds called Mr. Wizard's a Dick! that compiles a bunch of snippets from the 1983 revival of Don "Mr. Wizard" Herbert's television show which shows him...uhhhh... being a dick...

I was never much a fan of Mr. Wizard, but I was a big fan of Bill Nye The Science Guy. And now there's hope that he might start making new episodes of his awesome science show straight from the horse's mouth via Reddit...

Yeah, I really should be too old for a children's science program... but I would totally watch that show.

   
• Rotten. Let's recap my recent experiences with Apple, shall we?

• I get my free upgrade code for OS X Mountain Lion. It doesn't work.
• I call AppleCare for help and am promised a new code. A day later, I still don't have it.
• Tired of waiting, I pay for the download and then request a refund since I was promised a free upgrade when I bought my MacBook Pro Retina.
• My new 5-month old iMac is ruined by Mountain Lion and crashes at random. After a clean install, it just gets worse.
• While my MacBook Pro and MacBook Pro Retina seem to be fine after upgrading, my older Mac (which meets all the requirements) is now freaking out after receiving Mountain Lion, sometimes going non-responsive or randomly quitting apps.
• I get an email back from Apple telling me that they understand that I "unintentionally purchased OS X Mountain Lion from the Mac App Store and am requesting that the charges be reversed." Well, obviously they DON'T "understand" anything, because it wasn't "unintentional." They warn me that if the charges are reversed, Mountain Lion will be erased from my "Past Purchases" and I won't be able to download it again. Since I still plan on getting a redeem code from Apple, I agree.
• After attempting to do a second clean install of Mountain Lion on my iMac from the recovery partition, the computer is bricked. Won't even boot now except from the recovery partition, even though the install seemed to go okay.
• I receive a condescending email from AppleCare telling me "After reviewing the circumstances of your case, we determined that issuing you a refund for the purchase of 'OS X Mountain Lion' is an appropriate exception to the App Store Terms and Conditions, which state that all sales are final." and... "The iTunes Store provides a warning message that asks if you are sure that you want to buy an item." I want to write back and tell them to stop trying to shame me into believing I did something wrong when THEY were the ones who fucked up my redeem code, but accept my refund and say nothing.
• Finally receive my second redeem code replacement. But when I go to use it, the code gives me OS X Server, not OS X Mountain Lion.
• Write yet another email to Apple requesting a third redeem code since the first two didn't work.
• Created a Mountain Lion Install boot disk on a USB drive so I can (hopefully) completely wipe my new iMac and start over from scratch. I'll let you know how it goes...

So, basically, over the past week I've had more horribly bad experiences with Apple than I have had over the past 35 years. This hurts. It physically hurts me.

   
And now... time to see if I can un-brick an iMac...

And so Apple's latest release of Mac OS X "Mountain Lion" has turned out to be a festering pile of shit. Which I admit is a pretty unfair comparison, because at least I could fertilize the flower bed with the festering pile of shit and get something beautiful out of it. With "Mountain Lion" it's just misery on top of misery, making this the first OS upgrade in the history of Apple Computer that I deeply regret having installed. Despite Apple's claim of over "200 more features"... the number of features I'd actually use are incredibly small, making this a pretty much featureless upgrade for me anyway. The fact that it has hopelessly fucked two of the four computers I've installed it on is just icing on the shit cake.

As I mentioned yesterday, my new iMac is randomly crashing and rebooting for no reason I can figure... even with a total re-install. This makes getting work done incredibly stressful, and I find myself saving documents every two minutes just in case. To add insult to injury, waking iMac from sleep is horrible because the whole computer is lethargic and non-responsive. It's faster to shut down completely and start cold than even attempt putting the thing asleep. This is opposite of Mountain Lion on my MacBook, which wakes faster than ever. My older Mac is only half-working, sometimes acting a little schizo when it's asked to do something. On top of that, USB dongles, USB ethernet adapters, Samba networking, and a half-dozen other things I rely on are either not working at all... or only partly working... which is a huge bummer.

But, on Macs that ARE working properly, how has Apple done? Well, let's walk through Apple's big "feature list" shall we?

Apple's big catch phrase has been "It just works" and, for the most part, this is very true. Especially compared to Windows which mostly doesn't work and causes me overwhelming dread every time I have to walk over to use it. "I wonder what's going to go wrong this time?" I always say. But Apple has finally caught up to Microsoft because iCloud most definitely does not "just work." For one thing, it is actually lacking features of the iSync service it replaced! Want to sync your Keychain between all your Macs? Tough shit! You can't! And that's just the tip of the embarrassment iceberg for Apple, because the list of shit you can't sync with iCloud positively dwarfs what you can actually do with it. I have more apps syncing their stuff through DropBox because iCloud doesn't/can't/won't work for them. Even worse? It doesn't work for Apple either. You're supposed to be able to sync Notes and Reminders across all your Apple devices. Despite playing around for hours trying to make this happen, it doesn't work At least not completely. Some notes are just... gone... and even deleting them and recreating them does nothing to bring them into the iCloud so they can sync. Which is only half the problem, because one of my four Macs won't sync notes at all for reasons completely unknown. I have "Notes" checked to sync in iCloud, so what in the hell else is there for me to do?

This is amateur hour stuff, and if a Certified Apple Whore like me can't figure it out, what hope do everyday users have?

This is that on "killer feature" that was supposed to make Mountain Lion worth my trouble. But it has been the single most frustrating problem that I have yet to solve. Now, to be fair, a big part of what's going to make iMessage so compelling won't happen until Apple released iOS 6 this Fall... namely, tying your phone number to your iMessage account so you can actually get your iMessages on your Mac. Because right now, iMessages sent to your phone only go to your phone. In order to get your messages anywhere, you have to ask people to iMessage your Apple ID, which is pretty useless. If iMessage is going to take the place of texting, this is a critical piece of the puzzle. BUT ANYWAY... I was still looking forward to at least initiating iMessage conversations on my Mac. That way, when somebody replies, they're replying to your Apple ID and everything works as you want. Except... IT DOESN'T WORK AT ALL. Messages is just an epic pile of FAIL! that I fucking hate with the burning passion of a thousand suns. Because in order to get people to REPLY to your Apple ID, you have to actually be able to USE your Apple ID email. And, for reasons that make ZERO sense, it won't work on all my Macs.

Right now I am sitting here at my new iMac with my new MacBook Pro Retina next to it. They are running the same Mountain Lion OS. They are on the exact same network. They are plugged into the exact same router. They are set up the exact same. They are, in essence, the same damn computer. And yet... the MacBook will accept my Apple ID email address. My iMac won't accept it. No fucking clue why. But here it is...

Now, seriously, what the bloody fuck? I can sign into my iCloud account with my Apple ID email address on this machine with no problem... but when it comes to verifying the same damn address for use with Messages, you can't do it?!? WHY?!?? IT'S MY FUCKING APPLE ID, YOU PIECE OF SHIT!! And of course the address works fine on three other Macs, two iPhones, and an iPad, so I don't even know what to say here. Except that since I cannot set my "Caller ID" to be my Apple ID, Messages isn't going to work worth a shit for me and I might as well just use my iPhone for messaging.

Now, this is one of those little "extras" that's just mind-bogglingly cool. Basically, even after you put it to sleep, your Mac will still be working for you... checking email, syncing contacts and documents, even downloading software updates if you're plugged into a power source. So very smart. Or so I would imagine. My brand new iMac doesn't support it. My brand new MacBook Pro Retina does... but not yet, because the Firmware Update isn't available...

Something to look forward to, I guess.

UPDATE: That was quick. The MacBook Pro Retina firmware update was released on July 28th, so now I have the option of enabling Power Nap on my laptop.

Siri, Apple's "voice activated assistant" is a mixed bag that people either love or hate. Personally, I love Siri on my iPhone. It is an amazing tool that allows me to accomplish a heck of a lot with very little effort. Being able to say something like "Remind me to call Ronald McDonald in an hour"... and then have Siri ACTUALLY DO IT is a kind of magic that fulfills the promise of technology. And Apple keeps making Siri better and more accurate, so I have little doubt that within five years it will be a primary way that people interact with their Apple products. But right now it's still a bit rocky. And while iPhone gets the full "Siri Experience," Apple is moving their Macs into that realm with baby steps. Namely, "Dictation" which will take what you say and type it into words. The good news? For me at least, it's shockingly accurate. The bad news? It only works for snippets of text and you have to have a live internet connection... so no dictating your 500 page novel while on the beach. The worse news? "Dictation" is completely brain dead compared to "Siri" when it comes to actually typing out shit.

Here's a line of text dictated to Siri on my iPhone...
I am dictating a love letter to Taco Bell right now.

Here's that same line dictated to Dictation on my Mac...
I am dictating a love letter to cap taco cap bell right now.

I guess when working on a Mac, Apple thinks you'll never need to capitalize a word? Oh well... at least Dictation does seem to understand "period" and "question mark" so at least you can kinda type sentences.

Now, at first blush, this would seem an awesome idea. Any app can add a "share" button to automatically send some content to a specific app for further handling. For example, click the "Share" button in Apple's "Safari" web browser, and you're given options to add the page to your Reading List or Bookmarks... or email it... or send it as an iMessage... or even Tweet about it...

But there are some problems. First of all, you're only sharing a link to the page... which is fine for Twitter and such... but what if I want to email the actual page?? Well, you can't share that. There's no option to output a PDF or screen cap of the website and send it that way. You're restricted as to what Apple wants you to do instead of what you want to do. But it gets worse... you can only "share" with apps that Apple allows. If I wanted to "share" a link to that website with my blogging app, for example, I can't do that with the "share" button in any way. There's no global registry for apps to tell Mountain Lion what data they can handle, so Mountain Lion doesn't share unless Apple says it can. This is just a hopelessly flawed approach that I'm hoping Apple will fix very soon.

UPDATE: Oddly enough, other apps, like "Reeder" (my web feed reader) DO allow sharing with other apps... including my blogging app. I am guessing that this is something specifically coded into Reeder, so having some kind of global registry that works universally is still important.

No longer having to open a web browser every time you want to update your Facebook status? Great! But... oh... no... wait a second... Mountain Lion can't do that. The feature is listed as "Coming this Fall." Well how stupid. Why advertise it as a feature NOW if it's MONTHS away? You could say that about anything! "Mountain Lion will wipe your ass after you shit... coming August, 2027!" One thing I love about Apple is that they don't deal in vaporware. Most everything they announce is available that day... or very shortly after. This is a return to bad form and should have never been announced as a Mountain Lion feature. Just add it later when its ready and let people be thrilled to get a new tool. Anything less than that is not Apple.

Gatekeeper is an idea that's long overdue... helping users to be able to trust that a program they download isn't going to ruin their computer or damage their data in some way. And while a lot of times I think Apple goes too far in locking things down, when it comes to "Gatekeeper" I honestly don't think they went far enough. First of all, it's really just a warning device. It doesn't actually do anything to stop malicious code from running on your machine. Second of all, once Gatekeeper lets an app through, it just sits there like a dumb shit waiting for some new app to come along. Even if Apple finds out that an app contains a raging virus that will delete everything on your computer, Gatekeeper will only warn you if you try to re-install it... it won't in any way warn you that you've got a problem already installed. This is insanity. At the very least Gatekeeper should monitor the apps on your Mac and be able to alert you if one of them has been found to contain a problem! Oh well. At least the technology has been given a name that reflects its shortcomings. As for me, I'm waiting for fucking DungeonMaster to come along and watch more than just the gate.

Web browser competition is some serious shit. Every company wants to control your portal to the internets, and Apple is no different. Safari was developed specifically to counter the dominance of Microsoft's crappy Internet Explorer browser and, on Macs and iPhones at least, it has been working. But there's always a better browser being built, so you can't really rest on your laurels or savvy internet users will leave you behind. Apple knows this, so they've always been improving Safari so people won't move on to Google Chrome or whatever the flavor of the day is. With Mountain Lion, Apple takes a couple steps it should have taken a long time ago... #1 would be offline browsing. Nothing pisses me off faster than loading a web page to read, getting interrupted for boarding a plane with no WiFi, then opening my laptop to find that Safari has stupidly erased the page and is trying to reload it. Whomever made that fucking stupid decision should be punched in the face. #2 would be a unified address bar/search box. Having them be two separate fields for so long is an affront to the simplicity that Apple is supposed to be all about. So, bravo Apple for fixing two problems you really needed to fix.

But all is not wine and roses for Safari. Unfortunately, it remains one of the stupidest fucking browsers on the planet. And I don't mean "stupid" in that the whole app is bad... I mean "stupid" in that the whole app is ragingly unintelligent. A big example of this is something called "data detectors" and it used to be something Apple was really good at. Now? Not so much.

Let's take addresses, for example. If you get an email with an address in it, Mail will kindly detect this and allow you to add it to your Contacts (address book). Safari, on the other hand, doesn't know what the fuck it is, and just throws a kitchen sink's worth of crap at you when you right-click on it...

Now, you may look at this and say "Hey! You're WRONG! Apple has an option to look up that address in Google Maps, so it DOES know it's an address after all!" — And you would be right. Except not really. Because if Safari actually did recognize it as an address, I'd be able to add it to my Contacts (address book), which it doesn't. Nope... I have to copy and paste it. Except not really. Because Contacts is just as fucking brain-dead as Safari is... AND IT'S SOLE FUNCTION IS TO HANDLE ADDRESSES! Try pasting that as an address into Contacts and it fails miserably. Instead, you have to copy the street, paste the street... copy the city, paste the city... copy the zip, paste the zip... copy the phone number, paste the phone number... which is just a huge waste of time when Safari should be able to handle all this automatically like Mail does. And that's just one example of many I could give. Apple needs to do more than just fix problems they should have fixed a long time ago... they need to make Safari much, much smarter. Otherwise, they're just going to be left behind.

As for the other features on the list? Well, Twitter integration is pretty basic (you can post and receive mention notifications only), but works as advertised. AirPlay works great with AppleTV... just like it does from iPad/iPhone... but I'll rarely use that. GameCenter and new "China Features" I won't be using at all (I have a Wii and Xbox for gaming and don't speak or read Chinese).

So... all in all... Mountain Lion has been a massive disappointment. Coming from an unapologetic Apple Whore such as myself, that's saying quite a lot. It would be easy to pin this on the fact that Steve Jobs is gone, but I think the problem is much bigger. Apple's main focus is no longer Macintosh. Sure the division makes them a lot of money, but it pales in comparison to the revenue generated by the whole iPhone & iPad phenomena, so that's where they concentrate their efforts. And if this sad, bad, and wholly disappointing update to their Mac OS is a sign of things to come, then Apple needs to take drastic action... perhaps as drastic as splitting the company apart... for the Mac to survive. Because Microsoft is just aching to steal the computer spotlight from Apple, and their latest Windows 8 OS offering looks like they're taking a serious shot at doing just that. This is something Apple simply cannot afford, because there's no Steve Jobs to bring them back next time.

And with that happy thought, I am actually worrying about Macintosh again for the first time in a decade.

Now that Mountain Lion has been more of a whimper than a roar and there's no more Big Cats for Apple to label their OS with... what's next? Hopefully an animal that's much bigger and badder than a Lion, but I have no idea what that might be.

Insert Honey Badger joke here.

My first three installs of Apple's latest OS X update, code-named Mountain Lion, went off without a hitch.

But the fourth time was not a charm, and so now my iMac is randomly crashing then rebooting every half-hour or so. Needless to say, I'm thrilled. Turning off everything I've got installed (even if it works fine on my other Mountain Lion Macs) didn't help. A clean install didn't help either. So now I'm wondering if it's a firmware update I missed, but nothing is showing up for that either. Blargh. I really don't have time for this crap...

I guess I need to sacrifice a goat to Steve Jobs or something. This really blows.

And so Apple has made me poor.

Again.

Except not really. Yes, their new MacBook Pro with Retina Display has put me in debt, but it's also replacing my aging and busted MacBook Pro which I use constantly for my work. And replacing it beautifully. It is without question the most remarkable laptop... most remarkable computer... I have ever seen or had the privilege to use...

And while the "Retina Display" alone would make this machine a quantum leap beyond any other portable, Apple didn't stop there. They have adopted many of the same features which make their beautiful MacBook Air line so revolutionary. It's the crossroads of power and portability, and hands-down the ultimate laptop for graphics work like I do every day.

Except it's gonna cost ya. The cutting edge always does.

I'm going to run through all the specific features in an extended entry, but the bottom line is that the minimum baseline configuration for this machine costs $2,199. For work like I do, you really need the next step up, which runs $2,799. But I felt I needed something stronger, so I customized a machine that has the faster 2.7/3.7GHz CPU (+$250) and a maxed-out 16GB of RAM (+$200), which totaled a whopping $3,249. I stuck with the 512GB Flash Storage (Solid State Drive) because it was enough for me (it's bigger than the 320GB hard drive in my old MacBook Pro!) and I couldn't justify the additional $500 to bump that up to 768GB.

Now, when I look at that $3,249 price tag, a part of me wants to start screaming. But this isn't a toy that I use to just read email and surf the web... it's a critical work tool which I use to make a living every day. For me at least, it's a bargain. And every time I sit down to use it, I know exactly where that money went. The MacBook Pro with Retina Display is a boon to my productivity and a pleasure to use. I love it passionately, and can't imagine going back to a "regular" laptop.

If you want to know why, all my notes are in an extended entry...

As I catapulted off the runway of San Francisco International Airport this morning, a kid in the row across from me shouted "WOW! THIS IS JUST LIKE ANGRY BIRDS!"

This was good for a laugh, which I desperately needed. Because as we were taking off at 10:10am, I knew that I'd be missing out on all the cool stuff happening back on the ground in San Francisco's Moscone Center. It was there that Tim Cook would be taking the stage to introduce some of the cool new stuff that Apple had been working on, and I was going to miss it.

After landing in Seattle, I drove 2-1/2 hours, went to work until 7:30pm, then (finally) made it home so I could plop in front of the television and watch the Apple WWDC Keynote stream from my iPad to my Apple TV box. What follows is the deranged ramblings of a Certified Apple Whore, so proceed at your own peril...

   
• WELCOME
The Siri intro was pretty darn funny. Tim Cook was suitably channeling his inner Steve Jobs. The crowd was enthusiastic and the energy in the room was high. Then Tim ran through the astounding numbers touting the unprecedented success of the company and its products. After that, it was time for one of those heartwarming videos that Apple does so well... informative and inspiring without being sappy or tacky. And then? Off to what people really want to see.

   
• MACBOOKS
I need a new laptop to replace my aging, banged-up MacBook Pro, so I was understandably excited when Phil Schiller took the stage. I wanted so badly to have a machine with the power and 15-inch screen-size of a MacBook Pro, but the thinner form, lower weight, and fantastic SOLID STATE HARD DRIVE from the MacBook Air. At first, I didn't think I was going to get it, because Phil just rambled off expected bumps in speed and features for the existing models. But then something happened...

Introducing the MacBook Pro with Retina Display... AND ALL THE STUFF I WANTED IN A NEW LAPTOP! Thinner? Lighter? Faster? Quieter? SOLID STATE HARD DRIVE?!? Yes please. I am now officially poor, as there was no way I could pass up on something that will save me a lot of time, money, and agony when trying to work while on the road...

   
• MAC OS X - MOUNTAIN LION
Call me jaded, but it seems as though innovation is coming a lot slower to Apple's desktop products than their mobile products. In fact, the features shown for OS X that interest me most were those that make it easier to go from my laptop to my iOS mobile devices. Where are the compelling new OS X features that are redefining the non-mobile user experience? I dunno. Instead we get tighter integration with Twitter and Facebook. Whee. Don't get me wrong, any improvements or new features are appreciated)... especially for a jaw-dropping $20 price tag... but come on. This was kinda lame. Especially when you take a look at what Microsoft is up to for their next OS.

   
• iOS 6
Uhhh... yeah... it all sounds great. BUT I HAVE TO WAIT UNTIL THIS FALL?!? I'm assuming that this release date will coincide with the release of a new iPhone, but sheesh.

In any event, the new features really do sound great. The new maps look fantastic (and apparently the data is served up by TomTom, so they're be functional too!). Siri just keeps getting better. FaceTime over cellular and Mail "pull-to-refresh" are long overdue. Passbook is going a long way towards helping people lighten their wallet. The new integration with Twitter and Facebook is nifty. And the Accessibility enhancements are GOLDEN when configuring iOS products for non-techies.

BUT WHAT ABOUT THE "PHONE" PART OF iPHONE?!?

I still think it is embarrassing (and fucking stupid) that there's no auto-redial on my iPhone. WHY?!? Why in the hell would such an obvious and useful feature keep getting the shaft at Apple? Insanity! But at least they are addressing my long-standing complaints regarding having some control over your incoming calls. They call it "Do Not Disturb"...

FINALLY... AT LONG LAST... I will be able to block unimportant calls and mute non-essential notifications when I don't want to deal with the shit. LIKE WHEN I'M SLEEPING! And, from what I can see, it looks pretty smart. Apparently you can one-touch do not disturb AND have an automatic do not disturb schedule going... hopefully both at the same time.

And that's all she wrote. No new iPhone... yet. No new desktop Macs... yet. No new iToast... yet.

I guess there's always next year.

I've been so busy that I haven't had time to play with the new iPad (third generation) much. That's a darn shame, because it's kind of expensive to just have sitting around on my nightstand. I had to get one for the apps I help develop, so what can I do but sink even more money into Apple's ample coffers? The latest iPad has an all-new hi-res screen, and I have to be sure that stuff I design looks good on it. Otherwise, the iPad3 didn't look to bee much different than the iPad2, so I probably wouldn't have bought one otherwise.

Except, now that I've had a chance to read my comic books on it, I would totally have spent the money on it. I've read a few reviews in the press bitching about how iPad3 wasn't enough of an improvement over iPad2 for Apple to have bothered... which I now know is a huge load of bullshit. If you do any reading on iPad, this is a complete game-changer. Four-times the pixels make for a hundred times better screen, and I am loving it more than I ever thought possible.

The screen is so crisp and clear that I can now read ComiXology "CMX-HD enhanced" pages full-screen without having to zoom in on the individual panels...

Now, when looked at on a "regular resolution" computer screen, the change may appear subtle. But when reduced four-fold, the "SD" panel on the bottom becomes a blurry mess that's a bit difficult to read. The "CMX-HD" panel on the top, however, is razor sharp on iPad3.

So now the iPad is a real option for reading comics. Yes, the screen size is smaller than a "regular" comic book, but it's bigger than a digest, which is perfectly acceptable. And, unlike a digest, you can zoom in and see details if you want without having to find a magnifying glass.

So, my hat is once again off to Apple for once again making an awesome product even more amazing. iPad2 was already leagues above any of the competing "tablets" I've had a chance to play with, but this is entering a whole new dimension, as this snapshot from Apple's website demonstrates...

A few things...

• I may have major criticism of Apple's iCloud when it comes to streaming music and using email, but for setting up a new iPad, it's glorious. Just sync with the cloud, and everything will be set up exactly like your previous iPad was... right down to the position of your apps.
• There have been reports of the new iPad having trouble staying connected to wireless networks and having poorer reception. I haven't experienced any of this.
• If you are a ComiXology customer for comic books and switching to an iPad3, be sure you login with your ComiXology account when restoring your purchases... not your Apple ID. Otherwise, any purchase you made on the ComiXology website won't show up. You'll then have to delete the app and start all over.
• The dictation feature is superb, and rarely makes mistakes... even when I use wacky words. Still think it's stupid that Siri wasn't included though... hopefully it will be added with a future update.
• The rear camera is ridiculously good. Not that I plan on taking a lot of photos with my iPad, but it's nice to know I'll get good results if I do. I was a little bummed that the FaceTime camera wasn't upgraded, however. I guess they gotta save something for iPad4? But that's pretty lame.
• The display, while stunning, seems to run darker than my previous iPad2. I have the brightness cranked way up, which is undoubtedly chewing up my battery faster. The good news is that even at a higher brightness setting, the screen doesn't have that hideous technicolor glow that plagues Samsung tablets I've seen.
• It's not just comic book reading that benefits from the iPad3's new screen... some other apps I use that have been upgraded for the "Retina Display" are now eye-popping as well. Most notably... "Numbers," Apple's spreadsheet app. Previously, I had to zoom in so far to read the numbers that I couldn't fit many cells on the screen. This was hugely frustrating as I had to scroll back and forth to work. But now I can zoom way out and have a much easier time of it. Productivity and work apps are usable now.
• As for the battery... it seems to run about the same length of time with a full charge as my last iPad. It does, however, seem to take longer to charge. But I've read something about the battery display not indicating a full charge properly, so maybe that's not the case. In any event, you'll want to use the wall charger that came with iPad to charge the thing... plugging into the USB port on my MacBook barely charges iPad3 at all.
• I didn't notice the slightly thicker size of iPad3 vs. iPad2 until I read about it. Now that I know about it, I admit that it is noticeable... if only a little bit. The faster chip and better display have to get their extra power from somewhere, so I guess they needed that tiny height/weight bump for more battery.
• There's been a big brouhaha over the iPad3 running a lot hotter than iPad2. I haven't noticed it. But, then again, I use my SmartCover to prop it up when using it, so I'm never coming into contact with it to feel anything. I purposely ran some processor-intensive apps for an hour, but still didn't notice it running hotter than before when I put my hand directly on the back, so I dunno what the problem is other people are having.
• Lastly... I usually buy the lowest-memory configuration on iPads and iPhones (16 GB) because I just don't store a lot of stuff. If I'm not using an app, I delete it. If I'm not reading a book, I delete it. Since I can always re-load purchases at a later time, I don't waste memory keeping them if I'm not using them. But this time I went for the 32 GB model thinking that the new higher-res comics and movies might take more space. I'm glad I did, because indeed they do. The CMX-HD comics are around double the size. Also, the apps are bigger since they have the larger graphics in them. Apple really should think about increasing the memory in their lineup next time around to help out, because 16 GB is quickly getting too small.

Otherwise, for the most part, iPad3 is pretty much the same as iPad2. Which is not a bad thing at all, because iPad2 was so kick-ass. Indeed, when it comes to comparing it with all the tablets I've seen, Apple has the only game in town. Sure iPad is a bit pricey, but you get what you pay for, and what you get is pretty darn amazing.

It's products like iPad3 that make it so dang easy to be an Apple Whore.

After my dentist check-up this morning, I went to meet friends for lunch. When we arrived at the restaurant, I noticed my iPhone was missing. I knew that I had it when I left the dentist, but had no idea how I could have lost it. Using the "Find my iPhone" app on my friend's iPhone, I saw that my iPhone was back at our initial meet-up point. I don't know how, but I dropped/left it there.

I was relieved, but also... a little freaked.

How would I explain losing my iPhone if I actually lost it?

OFFICER: What do you mean you lost your iPhone?
DAVE2: I dunno! I had it, then suddenly it was gone!
OFFICER: Gone? You don't lose something so precious as an iPhone.
DAVE2: I did! I swear it!
OFFICER: What are you hiding? Did you kill your iPhone?
DAVE2: No! I would never! I love my iPhone!
OFFICER: Why don't I believe you, Mr. Simmer?
DAVE2: =sob!= A DINGO ATE MY iPHONE!!

Wikipedia dingo photo by Benjamint444

And speaking of iPhone, there's some kind of bullshit going on concerning a new SIM card standard that Apple is wanting. From what I can tell, it's a much, much smaller card than usual, which will give Apple more room to add cool stuff to their phones or make them smaller.

But competing phone companies like Motorola, Nokia, and RIM are crying foul. They want THEIR new idea for a SIM card to be the standard, and are saying Apple's idea isn't as good. So they're all appealing to some kind of ruling body for SIM cards to try and get Apple's card blocked.

I can tell you right now... if I were on that ruling body, I would totally have one thing to say to Motorola, Nokia, and RIM... SHUT THE FUCK UP! IF IT WEREN'T FOR APPLE, WE'D STILL BE USING YOUR OLD SHITTY MOBILE PHONES, INSTEAD OF THE APPLE-INSPIRED PHONES YOU'RE MAKING NOW...

Mobile phones BEFORE and AFTER the iPhone... Image taken from Digeratii

In all honesty, any "ruling bodies" should give Apple whatever the hell they want. Apple is the company that's driving the mobile phone market now, and everybody else can just get out of the way. Then Motorola, Nokia, and RIM can go back to copying what Apple does next instead of fucking up where Apple is wanting to take us.

Ooh! I'm more of an Apple Whore than usual today!

I guess that's what the trauma of almost losing your iPhone can do to you.

30 DAYS DRAWING CHALLENGE: Draw a Place You'd Like to Go...

THE MOON, BABY! But I'd settle for Antarctica. Or India. Or even Cambodia.

Yesterday morning was a mad rush to get to work. I had been attacking my to-do list since 4:00am, and really need to get to the office so I could get everything sent out. This meant skipping breakfast, throwing my crap into my backpack, then storming out the door.

Where I proceeded to drop my iPhone on the pavement.

And then accidentally kick it across the parking lot when I bent over to pick it up.

So now my beautiful iPhone has a giant crack running down the front along with assorted chips in the glass...

Not a pretty site.

What's odd is that this is the first time I've damaged an iPhone in the five years I've been buying them. Over the years I've dropped them numerous times... I even dunked one in a waterfall... but they've never been worse for wear. Which is odd, because before I got my first iPhone, my mobiles were breaking all the time.

I'm rough on phones, yo.

So, after drop-kicking my current iPhone, I honestly did expect to pick it up and have it be fine. To see that big-ass crack there shouldn't have shocked me, but it really did. Oh well. Given the abuse I heap on these things, it was bound to happen eventually. The good news is that everything is still working fine.

And now my iPhone is off to the good people at iResQ so they can replace his face. Don't ask me how I'll manage without it until Friday... I honestly don't know... but I'm sure plenty of comfort chocolate pudding is in order.

= sob! =

ZOMG, YOU GUYS! PEE-WEE HERMAN WAS ON TOP CHEF TONIGHT!

I'm a huge fan, and he did not disappoint. Have to say though... Tom Colicchio saying "I've gotta agree with Pee-Wee..." is something I never thought I'd hear.

And speaking of things I never thought I'd hear (at least in this decade)... Washington State's Senate passed a Marriage Equality Bill tonight, which means we're one step closer to becoming the seventh state to allow same-sex marriage. That's a pretty big deal for a lot of Washingtonians being able to fulfill this country's promise of pursuing happ...i...ness...ss... and... HOLY CRAP THERE'S A SPIDER CRAWLING UP THE WALL!!!!!

GAH!

Poor spider. He probably came inside to get out of the cold and I had to catch him and throw him back outside. Probably not a lot of food for him out there. Wah! I wonder if it would have been less cruel to smoosh him than to let him starve to death. But I can't bring myself to kill anything if I can help it. Argh.

I hate it when stuff like this happens.

Anyway...

My new work computer arrived today (thank you for the speedy delivery, Apple!). I admit that when I ordered it I was a little worried about how an iMac would fare for professional use. But, now that I've had a chance to play with it for a while, I have to say that I am very happy with the machine...

For anybody who's interested, I've put my thoughts on the iMac in an extended entry...